From Bob's Cluttered Desk

I read disturbing news last week. Very disturbing news. Birth rates in this nation have dropped to their lowest level in over 25 years. While we were once the envy of the world, maintaining a “replacement perfect” rate of 2.1 births per woman in this country, we have in recent years slipped to an unimpressive…

I have often lamented that employers do not understand that workers' comp is a controllable cost. Too often they treat it as a necessary evil that they must simply contend with, and never really pay attention to the fact that they have influence over costs; through both prevention and effective claims management. That is why…

I think claims people in workers' comp do not get a fair shake from the industry.  I have heard a few people over the years use the phrase “he's just a claims guy”, or “they are only in claims”, when talking about some person who happens to work in that area within the workers' compensation…

August 9th represents the one year anniversary of this blog, “From Bob’s Cluttered Desk”. When I launched it, I really had no idea what I would use it for, or how often I would post. When I announced the blog, I wrote at the time that I hoped to post with more reliability than a…

Last week I wrote about a corporate CFO and Treasurer who torpedoed his own career by videotaping himself ripping a drive thru cashier at Chick-Fil-A over the beliefs of her company’s president. While this simpleton proved that you don’t need to possess intelligence or common sense to attain high positional status, that was not that…

Yesterday a federal court stopped Tennessee Titans offensive line coach Bruce Matthews attempts to receive workers’ compensation in the state of California. The three-judge 9th Circuit court upheld an arbitration award barring the former offensive lineman from attempting to get benefits under workers’ compensation law in California.  Mathews spent 19 years playing football for the…

Ok, I have to confess. It is Sunday night. I am sitting in a bar at Harrah’s in St. Louis, MO, preparing to attend a conference to learn all about MSA’s, MSP’s and any other acronyms I cannot think of at the moment (more on that at a later date). As I sit here I…

An executive who posted a YouTube video of himself berating a poor Chick-Fil-A drive thru worker over her company president's position on gays really proved a point this week. He proved that you can get fired for doing something pointless and stupid. Adam Smith was CFO and treasurer of Tucson, AZ based medical supplies manufacturer…

An Executive Inspector General hired by the city of Chicago to look into any complaints of fiscal mismanagement by the city, has been denied access to records of the city’s $100 million, self-managed, self-insured workers compensation program. The denial comes from the city who hired him in the first place. Way to keep things honest…

In what had to be a most memorable airboat tour of the Florida Everglades, an Indiana family was treated to a rare and special event, when their tour boat operator demonstrated how not to entice an alligator to leap. Then they got to see him drive an airboat with one hand. Then they got to…